Preview

The Great Cat Massacre Review

Good Essays
Open Document
Open Document
493 Words
Grammar
Grammar
Plagiarism
Plagiarism
Writing
Writing
Score
Score
The Great Cat Massacre Review
The Great Cat Massacre entails understanding history differently. It is the story of vengeance of some ill fed journeymen at the face of their bourgeoisie master’s attitude. The pranksters carry out their master plan by killing the Cats and then staging a mock trial. What the author point outs is the humor that they share at the face of this cruelty and he urges the reader to understand the Rabelaian humor contextualizing the event against the backdrop of the peasant society of the Ancien Regime. Darnton shows why they chose the cats and how cats are metaphoric in western linguistic and cultural tradition. He brilliantly depicts the relation Cats bare with female sexuality, witchcraft, routine slangs and so on. The killing of cats is not just a frenzy killing that came out of a berserk reaction against the bourgeoisie, but it was metaphorically ravaging the bourgeoisie master whom they cannot reach out for physically at least. In the analysis of folklores of the Red Riding Hood or the La Renarde Darnton believes that these folklores help us understanding the pulse of the peasant society of France. He gives an entire overview of the French peasantry and the hardships they endured following, which he gives a fascinating folktale of the Sorcerer’s Apprentice, which includes a number of shape shifting charisma of the man and the devil following the eventual victory of man and the author follows that this reflected the essential idea of fighting over scarce resources. The use of culture here is “strictly in the Geertzian sense, as expressed, for example, in The Interpretation of Cultures as "an historically transmitted pattern of meanings embodied in symbols, a system of inherited conceptions expressed in symbolic form by means of which men communicate, perpetuate and develop their knowledge about and attitudes towards life." Under what conditions can a historian legitimately make use of a definition of this sort? What attitude does it imply vis-a-vis texts

You May Also Find These Documents Helpful

  • Satisfactory Essays

    Endocrinology Study Guide

    • 876 Words
    • 4 Pages

    B. It binds to the target cell surface receptors and never goes through the membrane.…

    • 876 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    Rape culture is an idea that helped define a generation in the 1970’s and continues to hold significance in modern society. Although the term itself has been recently coined, the norms of rape culture have been seen in civilizations for centuries. Sir Gawain and the Green Knight, a 14th century poem, displays ideas of rape and dominance within its stanzas. From a feminist lens, the role of Lady Bertilak is symbolic of Rape Culture through a display of dominance and disrespect from her husband and Sir Gawain, her objectification as a pawn in her husband’s games, the theme of hunting as it creates a parallel between the bedroom scenes and the actual hunt, and her representation of the whole female population.…

    • 1120 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Anthropology helps historians to make sense of the belief in witchcraft by presenting facts. Such scholars such as Francesco Maria Guazzo, who wrote “Pact with the Devil”, and Evan-Pritchard who wrote “Sorcery and Native Opinion”, each interpret witchcraft differently. Evan-Pritchard uses anthropology, or the study of humans past and present, to examine a group in Africa, the Azande and their understanding of witchcraft. Guazzo defines witchcraft by listing specific steps on how to identify a witch, and explaining them extensively. Is it the facts of misfortune that are in the experience of the Azande people, explained by Evans-Pritchard or the identification of witchcraft described by Guazzo that ultimately lead to the execution of Tempel Anneke?…

    • 985 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    The purpose of this paper is to introduce, discuss, and analyze the book "The Return of Martin Guerre" by Natalie Zamon Davis. Specifically, it will discuss the life of the peasant during the Middle Ages. This book is a fascinating account of a true case that happened during the 16th century in France. The book is also an excellent example of how the peasants lived in the Middle Ages, from what they ate, to how they traveled and what their family lives were like.…

    • 1087 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    C.S. Lewis, besides being the author of many popular children’s stories, was a professor of medieval literature at both Cambridge and Oxford. Contrary to what might be supposed, he was not an author by career, and much of what he wrote was in the same vein of his area of expertise, literary analysis. “An Experiment in Criticism” is his longest and most complete work, and also the most layman friendly. While the outlook and perspective he takes in his book conforms roughly to the definition of reader-response criticism, it is also very much his own work, and a great number of things he says, and the narrative approach he takes, would not be included in a textbook entry. Nevertheless, C.S. Lewis was, in the words of Rowan Williams, Archbishop of Canterbury, "an exceptionally good literary critic”.…

    • 852 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    Montaigne’s essay “On Cruelty” revels in satire, creating a work that questions the intricacies of European culture, specifically relating to the concept of “virtue.” Montaigne’s criticism is oriented towards questioning a Renaissance European view of virtue, the hardships and struggles it requires, and how to align an innate sense of morality with a virtuous, reason- oriented state of…

    • 1475 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    M Cat Review

    • 1389 Words
    • 6 Pages

    In his conceptual book, Psychology, Theology, and Spirituality in Christian Counseling (1996), McMinn presents a convincing presentation of a multitasking counselor who has developed a niche in the counseling world. New age Christian counselors have developed simultaneous skills that embark on the areas of psychology, theology, and spirituality. This begins our journey down the path of understanding how values and perspectives can be changed as a result of a well rounded, multitasking Christian counselor.…

    • 1389 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Good Essays

    Geraldine Brooks’ novel of the 17th century plague, the “Year of Wonders”, conveys how religion and nature will inevitably remain opposing forces, through the eyes of the protagonist, Anna. Several notions regarding this topic exist throughout the novel, yet are mainly brought to mind by the inquisitiveness of Anna, and her independence.…

    • 1067 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Better Essays

    The focus of Dickens’s book centers on the hellacious government that rules France. Aristocracy and upper-class society work the puppet of the country’s government. Cover to cover, “The novel actually begins and ends with a description of the nobility’s abuses of the poor.” (Gonzalez-Posse 347). The book’s first words form a dichotomy between the lives of each class. Then in the final lines, Sydney Carton remarks on his sacrifice as he awaits the guillotine pressed on him by the wrath of the government. In the book, Darnay battles with his uncle, Monsieur de Marquis, about the unfair treatment from the aristocracy and that because of it “France in all such things is changed for the worse” (Dickens 127). Darnay’s concern about the manipulation and use of lower classes to socially raise people, like his uncle, heightens as they discuss the treatment, lack of acknowledgment, and to admit their neglect. Dickens uses this to prove the government’s dreadfulness. Most any peasant before 1775 experienced hardships, but without attention it worsens. Government has no disregard during this time as to how they treated their people and most provocatively demonstrate it “In perhaps the novel’s cruelest scene, soldiers play upon a common taboo and allow an executed man’s blood to run into a village well, knowing that the community will be obliterated.” (Rosen 94). Darnay continues to press his argument on his uncle about…

    • 2563 Words
    • 11 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Good Essays

    In his work, Candide, Voltaire uses satire as a means of conveying his opinions about many aspects of European society in the eighteenth century, a period known as the Enlightenment. This Age of Reason swept through Europe, offering differing views on science, religion, and politics. The following essay will outline the philosophical theory of Pangloss, a character of the novel and suggest how his optimistic worldview is challenged by numerous disasters. I will also justify the reasons Voltaire attacks hypocrisy, most prevalent in religion, and displays the cruel actions of the priests, monks, and other religious leaders. In the novel his anger becomes obvious towards the church and the nobility. I will relate to findings how Voltaire expresses his views about society. His belief that the separation of class, hypocrisy of organized religion, rampant materialism, lack of Free Will, and deficiency of compassion for others, all contributed to the lack of human liberty in the eighteenth century.…

    • 1437 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    The brutality of human nature is a central theme communicated throughout Briar Rose through the concept of genocide and the Holocaust: ‘one thousand a day’, and in particular in the middle section titled ‘home’ and through Josef’s vivid recount of his experiences in the Holocaust. The brutality of human nature is introduced by Yolen through the analogy ‘but not the bad fairy… not the one in black with big black boots and silver eagles on her hat’ where Yolen equates the Nazi guards of concentration camps to the ‘bad fairy’ in Sleeping Beauty. As evidently seen, Yolen introduces the concept of human brutality through fairy tale elements as she allures to Sleeping Beauty and the ‘bad fairy’ that will let ‘a great mist cover the castle and everyone will die’. The mist in a sense, represents the gas in the gas chambers where the prisoners where killed or Gemma’s imperfect knowledge of her family and of her past. In addition, the ‘barbs’ and the ‘briars’ symbolise the impassable thickets that aimed to keep the prisoners in the camp- rather than to keep outsiders out- that Josef describes as ‘living in the belly of the wolf’. In addition, the briars can also represent the difficulties that need to be overcome in order to extinguish the brutality of human nature. Yolen focuses the responder’s…

    • 1070 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Voltaire portrays an image of human suffering and cruelty in our world. He criticizes the philosopher Gottfried Leibniz’s optimism theory in the novel Candide. Candide was written by Voltaire and translated by John Butt in 1950. “Each particular contingent fact in the world has an explanation” (“God in Leibniz’s Theory” 1). In the novel, Candide’s teacher Pangloss believes that we live in “the best of all possible worlds.” This novel was written during the period of the Enlightenment. This era was a time of ideas about science and philosophy. The doctrine, “The Divine Right of Kings” and “The Social Contract” were written during this time. A major catastrophe occurred during the Enlightenment that shaped Voltaire’s attitude towards optimism. The Lisbon earthquake occurred on November 1, 1755. Fires from cooking and candles broke out after the quake as well as a Tsunami. Voltaire uses this earthquake as an event in the novel. Voltaire also uses his own experiences to relate himself to the character of Candide, as he was also exiled for his own ideas. Candide is a criticism of philosophy, religion, and politics. Throughout the novel, it’s evident that Voltaire took aim to target the flaws in Leibniz’s theory by criticizing optimism, organized religion, violence and war through the use of satire.…

    • 917 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    The tests that Gawain undergoes and the moral trials that he has to endure become a metaphor for other problems facing the 14th century aristocracy and women and feminine symbols are the author’s devices in assembling blame for the end of the feudal economy and way of life.…

    • 314 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Better Essays

    In a society with everlasting change and differences people clash on a prodigious scale. By analyzing the stories: ?The Yellow Wallpaper? written by Charlotte Perkins Gilman and ?My Last Duchess? by Robert Browning, one can take a look into the soul of mankind and attempt to define its ubiquitous desire for control and the backlash that ensues. ?Notice Neptune, though Taming a sea-horse, thought a rarity, Which Claus of Innsbruck cast in bronze for me!?(Browning, p. 53) The Duke?s desire for control is shown as he relates him self to a god attempting to capture the most extreme rarity of all: the unattainable enchantment of a sea-horse. Similarly, in ?The Yellow Wallpaper?, John?s naive understanding of the narrator?s condition lead him to attempt the type of control brought on by typical societal practices. By restricting the narrator?s awkward cry for creativity and freedom, he causes her unique mind to fabricate a world of greater comfort to suit her needs, however grotesque and frightening it seems to John?s belief system. ?John is practical in the extreme. He has no patience with faith, an intense horror of superstition, and he scoffs openly at any talk of things not to be felt and seen and put down in figures.?(Gilman, p.153) ?That?s my last Duchess painted on the wall, looking as if she were alive. I call that piece a wonder...?(Browning, p.52). To the Duke, the beauty of the Duchess can be reduced to a painting, and as he values her as an extravagantly rare possession, he never evaluates the fondness and innocence of her youth. His interest is to obtain subjects which have a high monetary value to society while only forming a less compassionate bond boisterous with horrid feelings of disposition and a vast hunger for manipulation. ?Oh sir, she smiled, no doubt, Whene?er I passed her; but who passed without much that same smile??(Browning, p. 53) The Duke?s thirst for attention causes him to become angry over the innocence or her naive disobedience. Finally…

    • 817 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Good Essays

    The story and its description can be perceived as a critique of our own society, because it reflects the erroneous and unjust actions witnessed in our cities, colonies and countries. Approximately in the middle of the narration before the curse of Omelas is described Le Guin implies this criticism when is said: “Do you believe? Do you accept the festival, the city, the joy? No? Then let me describe one more thing.” With these words the author asks if the readers believe in that “fairytale” city to let us know that she knows that we are thinking of the story as a complete fantasy, but also this quote gives us a foreshadow that the narration is going to take a drastic turn and some readers may also think to discover that what is going to happen next is going to be more credible, and it could amazingly be something a reader in the society we live on can relate to. Indeed, it helped connect with the story because it can be found similarities with the plot of the short story and throughout our history leaders that have abused of their powers to get…

    • 516 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays